On January 7, Fox & Friends hosted global warming critic Lord Nigel Lawson who asserted that "mind you, there is no warming going on. There's been no warming so far this century at all, as the figures show." Co-host Steve Doocy replied, "That's right."

From the January 7 edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends:

DOOCY: So you suggest we just keep using fossil fuels, carbon-based stuff until we figure out a way to come up with something that is cheaper and more widely available around the world.

LORD NIGEL LAWSON, FMR U.K. CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER: Right. What we need to do, common sense, is to use the cheapest form of energy available, and even if we in the developed, richer world are happy to pay more for our energy, there is no way that in China and India - India, for example, 30 percent of the population have no electricity at all, even at the present time, despite the great strides that the Indian economy has made. In China there are a lot of millionaires, but there are many, many more millions and millions and millions - tens of millions of desperately poor people. So what they want to do is focus on economic development. That means using the cheapest form of energy, which is carbon energy for the time being.

One day there may be technological breakthroughs and there may be other forms of energy that are cheaper but not for the foreseeable future. So what we gotta do is to carry on using the cheaper form of energy and adapt to whatever changes - mind you, there is no warming going on. There's been no warming so far this century at all, as the figures show.

DOOCY: That's right. All Right. You should know, you're the founder of the Global Warming Policy Foundation over in Great Britain. Lord Nigel Lawson, we thank you very much for joining us live.

Fact: 2000-2009 was warmest decade on record

WMO: "2000-2009, The Warmest Decade." In a December 8 press release[1], the World Meterological Organization reported that "[t]he decade of the 2000s (2000-2009) was warmer than the decade spanning the 1990s (1990-1999), which in turn was warmer than the 1980s (1980-1989)."

NOAA: "The 2000-2009 decade will be the warmest on record." On December 8, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric stated[2] that according to a preliminary analysis by NOAA's National Climatic Data Center, "[t]he 2000 - 2009 decade will be the warmest on record, with its average global surface temperature about 0.96 degree F above the 20th century average. This will easily surpass the 1990s value of 0.65 degree F."

Met Office data also shows 2000-2009 was warmest decade on record. Bloomberg reported[3] on December 8 that "[o]f the 10 hottest years on record, nine occurred in the 2000s, according to the Met Office, which said it expected temperatures to keep rising as a result of greenhouse-gas emissions." The article further noted that "Global temperatures are expressed by the Met Office as an "anomaly" from the long-term average. The 2000s were about 0.4 of a degree warmer than the 1961 to 1990 average, eclipsing the record 0.23-degree temperature anomaly of the 1990s, it said."

Scientists have identified a long-term warming trend that spans several decades. In a February 11 Guardian op-ed, Vicky Pope, the head of climate change advice at the U.K. Met Office Hadley Centre, explained[4] that claims about the pace of global warming require more than 10 years of data, "since natural variations always occur on this timescale." She continued: "1998 was a record-breaking warm year as long-term man-made warming combined with a naturally occurring strong El Niño. In contrast, 2008 was slightly cooler than previous years partly because of a La Niña. Despite this, it was still the 10th warmest on record." According to the Met Office website[5], the UN World Meteorological Organization "requires the calculation of averages for consecutive periods of 30 years," which was chosen "as a period long enough to eliminate year-to-year variations."